


Things Of Use

by entanglednow



Series: 13 Days of Halloween [13]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Forced Undressing, Horror, Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Immobilisation, Kidnapping, M/M, Non-Consensual Touching, Rituals, Summoning, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:28:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27298663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entanglednow/pseuds/entanglednow
Summary: Crowley has been in a summoning circle for more than a day, something terrible is going to happen. No one is looking for him, no one is coming.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: 13 Days of Halloween [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1977847
Comments: 80
Kudos: 358





	Things Of Use

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 'Ritual' prompt, for the 13 Days of Halloween list of prompts, made by racketghost. This is the very last prompt for Halloween! Thank you to racketghost for the list, I've had a great time filling them all out. And thank you to everyone who read any of my stories for the challenge and let me know you enjoyed them, I really appreciate it ♥
> 
> Extra tags for this one, which are all spoilers, can be found at the end....

He's been here for thirty-nine hours, sixteen minutes and twelve, thirteen, fourteen seconds.

Crowley's always had an excellent sense of time.

He wears a watch just for show. He doesn't even have to lift his arm to know how long it's been. Which is lucky, because he hasn't been able to move for thirty-nine hours, sixteen minutes and thirty seconds. The floor of the basement is warm underneath his cheek, more from the power needed to summon him than any body heat he might have seeped into the concrete. It's smooth, as if it had been carefully swept before he was dragged into the circle that now holds him.

That's not the reason he can't move, though he'd tried, Satan help him, he'd tried. He'd strained and thrashed inside his corporation for hours, tried to change form, tried to escape from the flesh entirely. But he's stuck where he is. There's a long knife through the palm of his hand and it burns cold, the solid atmosphere tang of it holy enough to pin him in place like a butterfly on cork. He can't feel that hand any more, he isn't sure he's getting it back afterwards...if there is an afterwards for him. Aziraphale's not expecting him, has no reason to look for him, not for weeks. That holy burn is spreading and if it reaches the centre of him he thinks that will be the last thing he knows.

He's shaken out of his thoughts by feet on the stairs, descending slowly, heavy this time as though they're carrying something. Crowley would hiss if he could, he would let his fangs extend, grab this arrogant presumptuous human by the throat and - the concrete warms under his struggling exhale.

Crowley's never killed anyone before, not personally, not with his own hands. Six thousands years of letting circumstances and accidents and their own stupidity be the end of them. The thought of actually reaching out himself, catching hold of a fragile human body and breaking it beyond repair - it feels like a failure somehow. But if there's an opportunity, if he gets a chance, one human life for his seems like a fair trade.

The basement door opens, letting in a draft of cold air that Crowley can feel prickling against his skin where it's exposed, at the back of his neck, where his shirt had ridden up, and the spread of one hand.

The other hand feels nothing at all.

Footsteps bring the man close. He has a forgettable face, if forgetting is something you're capable of, brown hair, brown eyes, nothing about him stands out as friendly, or particularly unpleasant. He has the neutral expression of someone simply completing a necessary task, as though Crowley doesn't matter to him at all. He would have expected fear, or curiosity, even something in the way of righteous certainty that he was battling the forces of evil. Crowley is a demon after all, but this man doesn't seem to care.

He feels the human's warm hands push up his sleeve, lift his arm from the floor and slice into the meat of his hand, a small slide of hot pain that leaves him bleeding into the bowl that's carefully placed beneath it. After the first soft sound of blood spilling there's nothing but the stranger's breathing and the faintest rasp of his knee shifting on concrete. Crowley can't see anything from his position, can't see what he intends to do next, but he can feel the steady throb of the open wound.

He hears pages turn, and the bowl is dragged out from under his arm. His hand left to settle back on the floor, and Crowley can feel the slow spread of liquid warmth as it's left to bleed

"The book doesn't make the quantities necessary for the ritual clear." The man's voice is flat, and he obviously doesn't expect a reply. "But I can test everything. After all, you're not going anywhere, I have time." He pushes himself to his feet, collects whatever he'd brought into the room with him, and then his feet take him back to the door.

Crowley hears him open it, and then the sound of it closing behind him.

-

Fifty-six hours, seven minutes and six, seven, eight seconds.

That's no time at all for them. Not long enough to worry. Not long enough for Aziraphale to miss him and start to wonder where he is.

Crowley can't see what the man is doing. He only has the clatter of something metal and the drag of something soft across the basement floor to tell him that the stranger is behind him. Until a hand abruptly touches his boot, fingers gripping and turning it so they can drag at the heel. It comes free in one reluctant slide, leaving his socked foot to drop back onto the concrete. The man doesn't stop there though, grabbing the sock and pulling that free too, before turning his attention to the other foot. Which suffers the same treatment.

His feet are turned. The shading of scales on the instep and toes that he always finds difficult to remove examined impassively, though there's no comment, only that slow breathing. Crowley wants to drag his feet back, wants to hiss and spit and ask him how he could fucking dare. But all he can do is breathe, and hate him with everything he has.

Crowley's foot is set back on the cold floor without a word.

The clatter of metal goes again, and something cold and hard is slipped up inside one leg of his jeans. The shearing sound starts immediately, denim parting under that slow push of metal up the back of his calf. The man is cutting his jeans off, and Crowley tries to clench his teeth, to tense, to resist. But there's nothing, his body remains completely still, stuck fast to the floor, rendered inert by a holy knife and the painted smears of his true name.

It submits against his will while the man cuts.

The slice reaches his waistband, then goes through it with effort, one side of his jeans falling away with his underwear, leaving his hip and leg entirely bare. The man starts on the other side with a quiet sort of efficiency, until that side falls away too, then he starts to methodically tug the material out from underneath him. Crowley's knees, thighs, balls and soft cock are pressed suddenly and uncomfortably to the cold floor.

A warm hand touches his back, where his shirt has been pushed up, and Crowley's skin crawls.

"I expected you to be marked in more significant ways. I certainly hoped for more in the way of demonic aspects. Your body's more human than I thought it would be. That's something of a disappointment. You're not really worth taking pictures of." The hand moves to his waist, then the man leans over and rolls him, until Crowley's head tips onto his stretched-out arm, and then slides off the other side. He's left sprawled on his back, naked from the waist down.

The nameless man is kneeling over him under the harsh basement lights, wearing an old jumper and worn jeans, looking so human and so fragile - if only Crowley could reach up, if only he could catch hold of him and _squeeze._ He knows that bland expression would crack, he knows it would go pale and open with surprise and fear -

Hard fingers press into Crowley's hips, before moving down to spread his thighs dispassionately. "You have genitals at least. Which makes the collection of semen a possibility. Something to try later if the blood doesn't work."

Crowley is going to kill him.

He's going to kill him.

Humans do it all the time for far less than this.

The scissors go up the front of his long-sleeved shirt, slice the fine wool in clean snips, and eventually that's tugged away too. Until there's nothing between Crowley and the basement floor. He's left sprawled naked on his back in the summoning circle, his legs spread open in a way that feels sickly threatening. But the man simply takes Crowley's sliced clothing and leaves, boots heading back up the stairs with steady steps. There's no fear in him. He knows that Crowley is no danger to him like this. It's as though everything is happening exactly the way he expected it to, or exactly the way he was told it would. There's a calmness to him, as though he has reason to believe that he's protected. Which is an unsettling thought, because if this was planned, if this was purposeful, then perhaps Crowley wasn't the only one targeted.

He hates the thought, because he can't do anything for Aziraphale here. He won't be the one to rescue the angel this time. He'll have to rescue himself.

Please let him rescue himself.

He can see his own arm from this angle though, and if he moves his eyes all the way he can even see the thin handle of the silver knife, inlaid with symbols that prove its ethereal nature. The frigid sting of it is now gnawing past his hand into his wrist, and he can see what that looks like from his new position.

His fingers are as black as his nails, the whole back of his hand depressed in, as if someone had crushed it under a heavy weight. The dark stain has taken his hand to the thumb, thin threads of it inside his veins, winding their way slowly but inevitably upwards.

The holy weapon is killing him.

-

Seventy-two hours, nine minutes and forty-two, forty-three, forty-four seconds.

Crowley is naked and freezing, the gnawing creep of ethereal infection is past his elbow. He can feel himself trembling but he can't make himself stop. If it reaches his shoulder and digs into his chest then he's dead. It will kill him for good. Permanent dead. Holy water dead. His whole body sanctified into non-existence, he'll never see Aziraphale again.

His angel.

Though he never did get to tell him that.

-

It's been - eighty-four - eighty-four hours, he thinks.

Crowley can't see, the world is swimming in and out. It feels like there are knives inside his arm and his whole body is too cold to exist. It feels like a hole has been bored into him, his demonic essence draining out and leaving a hollow, corrupted shell behind.

Someone is talking above him, muffled through the floor. He can't move, can't open his mouth to taste the air, he can no longer use any of his demonic senses. If the man has others here, other people, Crowley doesn't think that will go well for him. Other people means group rituals. Other people means a gathering and what better to bring out for one of those than a demon to slice up, or abuse, or drench in holy water just for show.

Other people are the end of him. He knows that much.

The muffled voices move, wavering in and out as Crowley struggles to concentrate. Loud and then soft and then louder. It's a lot like dreaming, but it hurts so much more.

And then it feels like the world is shaking, but that can't be right because he hasn't felt anything for hours.

Not just shaking - there's wood breaking. Snapping straight through like something fragile. Something's happening but Crowley can't turn his head to look, all he can do is lie here dying. The floor is grey and everything hurts. Everything hurts so much.

There are feet on the stairs and Crowley can't even roll his head to face his captor, can't glare or hiss or spit venom...not beg for his life, not that, never that. 

Shoes drift into his line of sight. New shoes. No, old shoes, brown brogues kissed by pale cuffs. He knows them. _He knows them_.

Aziraphale.

Crowley's blood is pounding, the stagnant air in his lungs struggling to rush out. The form crouches, brings himself into view, pale coat, blue shirt, bow tie, face of an angel.

_Angel_.

But Aziraphale isn't looking at him, he's looking at the holy knife through his hand, and Crowley watches his expression collapse in slow motion. He moves out of view - and for a few devastated seconds Crowley thinks that the angel had assumed he was already dead, that there was nothing left to save, nothing but the shell he used to inhabit, that he'd mistaken his stillness for death -

Only there's a crash and Aziraphale is back, falling to his knees, so close that Crowley can smell him, can feel the warmth of him. He moves his knee, presses it down hard on Crowley's lower arm, wrenching it straight - _and it hurts, it hurts_ \- if he could move he would be screaming. But nothing escapes from him except a wheeze of miserable agony, and then Aziraphale's arm lifts, something heavy and silver draws back in one movement, before plunging down fast.

The blade goes right through Crowley's arm, mid-way through the bicep, shearing through muscle and tendons and bone and slamming deep into the floor beneath. Crowley chokes a breath, and it bursts across the concrete as his whole body punches forward, the end of a scream wrenching free.

He's moving, he's moving under his own power, his whole body suddenly hot and alive. He's rolling away from his own blackened, withered limb, blood spattering and spilling across the concrete. Crowley is making noises through his teeth, his bare legs jerkily dragging upwards as his other hand stretches to claw in the angel's beige trousers. Aziraphale quickly pulls his bow tie free and that impossible, beautiful vision of an angel wraps it around Crowley's upper arm and then yanks it tight enough to have him shrieking through his teeth. Tight enough for the blood to stop endlessly spilling in a wash of red.

The angel is covered in it, his red fingers touching Crowley, his red knees on the bright concrete, though he doesn't seem to care.

Crowley has one arm. He has one arm but he's free, even if his body doesn't seem to know that yet. He's still shaking and he's so impossibly cold. "Aziraphale -" His voice is a fractured whisper, something left to rust and rot.

But the angel hurriedly strips his coat free at the sound, laying it across Crowley's naked shoulders, soaking the material with blood. Crowley had spent years keeping the angel's clothes clean, and it feels like sacrilege. But Aziraphale is dragging him in and sliding his arms around him, holding him so tightly, pressing his face to his hair and saying his name, over and over, like he might never stop.

**Author's Note:**

> Extra tags for the story - Amputation, Blood, Rescue, Comfort, Protective Aziraphale


End file.
